This invention relates to vendors, and more particularly to vendors for vending so-called snack products including bags of potato chips, pretzels and the like.
The invention is especially concerned with a spiral vendor of the rear-to-front type, such as shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,178,055, 3,269,595, 3,344,953, 3,591,045, 3,653,450 and 3,773,217, comprising a cabinet having a front door, shelves in the cabinet having their forward ends spaced rearward from the door to provide a drop space, helices on the shelves extending to rear-to-front direction with respect to the cabinet and adapted to receive items to be vended between their convolutions, the door having a window for viewing the forwardmost items, and means for rotating each helix to advance the items in the convolutions of the helix toward the forward end of the respective shelf and discharge the forwardmost items off the forward end of the shelf to drop down in said drop space.
Rear-to-front spiral vendors such as above-described have come into use for vending candy, gum and mints and so-called snack products, including bags of potato chips, pretzels and the like. A problem has been encountered in dispensing such bags in that in some instances the bags, instead of dropping, tip over and become bridged against the window of the vendor. Increasing the distance between the forward ends of the shelves and the window aids in reducing the occurrence of such bridging, and increasing this distance to a dimension greater than the height of the bags eliminates it without diminishing the capacity of the vendor. This increase in distance, however, introduces a new problem in that this increases the depth of the cabinet to the point where it is impossible to move the cabinet in (or out) through a doorway narrower than the overall width or depth of the cabinet. (In this regard, the width of the cabinet is generally greater than the depth). Consequently, the cabinet cannot be brought in (or out) through narrower doorways either in front-to-rear or side-to-side direction.